


Immigration and Allegiance

by LectorEl



Series: Flight over Fight [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Agender Character, Butterfly Effect, Dubious Ethics, Gen, Politics, Yoko hates their life, being an Uchiha sucks, ninja doing ninja things, the worst possible butterfly effect, yet another OC SI story
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-09-02
Updated: 2014-09-02
Packaged: 2018-02-15 20:26:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,944
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2242419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LectorEl/pseuds/LectorEl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sun was setting when Yoko stepped out onto the bridge between the kage's tower and the center market. The light gilded the mountains red and golden, and turned the waterfalls to jewels.<br/>Sunsets in Iwa are always beautiful.</p><p>- Or -</p><p>Reincarnation into the Naruto-verse was not in Yoko’s plans. Pity the world wasn’t listening.  What’s a mostly sane, not particularly suicidal person to do when reborn into a family doomed to die in less than a decade and a half? Run like hell, obviously.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Immigration and Allegiance

**[Present]**

As soon as they were out of the sight-line of the sending-off committee, Yoko muttered a soft ‘kai!’ and cancelled their genjutsu, deep, bruised bags appearing under their eyes. “Tell me we’re -” _yawn_ “- going to have a chance to rest before the summit. Please. I’m running on four hours of sleep out of the last seventy five.”

“Is Miyu-chan still sick?” Akatsuchi asked, a frown creasing his broad face.

Yoko shook their head. “It’s Minoru. His eyes are acting up.” They crooked their fingers to resemble a rough tomoe. “Mostly I’m worried he’ll do something foolish. He’s at that age, I suppose.”

“Like attending the chunnin exam of an enemy nation?” Kurotsuchi asked, grinning over her shoulder at the two. “I still remember the fit gramps threw about that.”

“Lies and slander. It was a perfectly well thought out decision.” Yoko almost managed a straight face until the end, and ruined it by giggling. “No, no, it was! I was a totally sane and rational individual at fifteen, and psych absolutely did not threaten to bench me indefinitely if I got one more bad eval.”

 _And I definitely did not go just to figure what alias my baby cousin was living under, and then make sure he wasn’t killed in the invasion._ Not that Yoko had much luck on either count - Sasuke’s match must have been scheduled after Gaara’s.

Onoki made a sound of deep disbelief. “So my memories of that time are -”

“Early onset senility. Sorry, it’s terribly fatal,” Yoko said without missing a beat.

“Hmph. Children these days…” Onoki muttered. Yoko hid a smile behind the sleeve of their traveling coat. One day, somebody _outside_ of Intel was going to realize that the tsuchikage had a sense of humor that revolved around making ‘old man’ jokes about himself and waiting to see if anyone noticed.

And then he’d pick up a new hobby, because he was a contrary old bastard like that.

“Seriously, though, with the Aburame situation on top of the invasion they just weathered, I don’t want to go into the summit at less than optimal - Konoha’s going to be twitchy.” Yoko hunched their shoulders in, uncomfortable. The last time they remembered Konoha being ‘twitchy’, there’d been a bloodline massacre.

“Don’t forget the new Mizukage is attending,” Kurotsuchi said cheerfully, all but skipping under Yoko’s poisonous glare.

“ _Why_ do I like you people again?”

“Captive’s syndrome.”

“Youthful stupidity.”

_Thud._

The last wasn’t actually a reply. Akatsuchi picked up their unwanted eavesdropper by the collar, holding the unconscious shinobi out for inspection. “That’s the last of them,” he said, tone vaguely apologetic. “Are we planning on interrogating him?”

“Not enough time to do it properly,” Yoko said, shaking their head. “Unless you think it’s worth the delay, Onoki-dono?”

“No. Secure him and send a message back to your department to handle it.” Onoki looked at the downed shinobi with an irritated scowl. Yoko nodded, and bit down on their thumb.

A few minutes later, a white-tailed kite took wing for Iwa, carrying a message written on onionskin. Its master, and their companions, already traveling again.

Hours later, as the sun sank below the horizon, the group reached winter-rock waypoint, set high in the cliffside above the main road. Akatsuchi created a ring of stone walls to block the worst of the wind, and Yoko, as the only one with fire-aligned chakra, started a low burning fire.

Kurotsuchi dropped to the ground wearily. “Who has the food?”

“...Ah. That’d be what I forgot,” Yoko said after an awkward pause.

“That explains this, then. Aoichi gave it to me before we left.” Kurotsuchi held up a canvas bag she’d unearthed from her luggage. “Rabbit jerky, chakra pills, and powdered electrolyte mix. Yum.”

Yoko snatched the bag out of Kurotsuchi’s hand. “It’s food, be grateful.”

“I’ve never been to Iron country before, this is exciting, don’t you think?” Akatsuchi asked, interrupting the brewing squabble.

Onoki huffed. “There’s nothing fun about it.”

“I don’t know, Minoru and I passed through there on our way to Iwa. They were kind enough,” Yoko contradicted. “We were officially civilians at the time, but still.”

Kurotsuchi sat up a bit. “What’s it like, gramps?”

“It’s a neutral country, with its own particular culture and authority, and a strong military.” Onoki’s voice had a sour twist that made Yoko smother laughter. Of course he disapproved - he probably despised the thought of competition.

“Samarai. Nice people, from what I remember,” Yoko added. Even Akatsuchi gave them a dubious look at that. “Really. They fed us, and gave us a ride back to the border. The coat I was wearing came from them. I’d considered settling there, actually.”

“Why didn’t you?” Akatsuchi asked.

Yoko stared off into the fire, expression going distant. “I don’t know, really. It just didn’t seem right, I suppose.” They shook their head, grinning crookedly. “But never mind that. The Yoko’s trauma and travelling circus show is _closed_ for the season. Tomorrow, on to the summit, and the inevitable disasters associated. And for now, I am going to sleep before I keel over dead. Good night.”

***

[Page 1, Notebook 1]

Little brother,

I'm writing this in the days before the summit of the kage. I hope to come back, but I can promise nothing. This won't be the last time I take such risks. Shinobi live in the shadow of death – there is no safety in this life.

You’ve activated your sharingan, and if you’re old enough to bear the risk of that, you’re old enough to know the truth. If I die, Minoru, if I'm captured or subverted, you'll be Head of our family. I don’t want to leave you unprepared.

You were young when we came to Iwa. Do you remember anything before that? Do you remember Konoha? Our family helped found that village, generations before. It is not in the normal order of things, for a clan to shift a foundational allegiance like that.

There's a story of how the Uchiha came to wear Iwa hitai-ate. It can be summarized simply: Our village betrayed us. How we two managed to survive the betrayal is slightly more complicated.

I had knowledge of the future. From my previous life.

If you're reading this, I'm already dead, or as good as, so I don't think there's much call for secrets. I have memories of a past life, in a different world. The history of the elemental countries was a story there, one I'd read. It focused on Konohagakure no Sato, because even in another world, Konoha has to have the spotlight.

It wasn't even a story I'd been particularly interested in, to add insult to injury. I'd been more drawn to science fiction works. If I'd known I'd be living it ahead of time, I would have paid more attention.

Hindsight is perfect, foresight poor. There’s nothing for it.

I don't even know how to explain the world I came from. It was so little like our own. There was no chakra, no shinobi. But we had weapons that could cause more destruction than a tailed beast could ever dream of, machines that could more damage in a day than a shinobi could do in a lifetime. I lived in a country with a standing military force larger than the entire population of the elemental countries. People believed they had a right to information as a matter of course. We had a huge network of signal towers and cables to allow us to communicate over vast distances, primarily used and maintained by civilians. We used it to view amataur video of pet cats and get into arguments with strangers.

Who I was, how I died – where, when, at whose hands – aren't things I feel like sharing, and they're not important. What matters was this: This new life I had, in the Uchiha clan, and the betrayal I knew was coming.

This is only the briefest record of that time period, but it still contains secrets Konoha will not want shared, and will kill to keep from reaching open air. I've told you before of Orochimaru, the snake sannin, who desires immortality, and our cousin Itachi, the one who killed the clan, and how you must never allow yourself to face either of them. Now I must add new names to that list. If you read on, take care what you reveal you know, and to who. Above all, beware ROOT, and beware Shimura Danzo.

The story of this life starts in Konoha, a few years before the Kyuubi attack.

I was born, I'm told, three weeks early, coming into the world blue-skinned and choking. Only the quick action of the medic-nins saved me. My new family – father, mother, elder sister and older brother – were told it was a minor miracle I'd survived.

My brother was Uchiha Shisui – the best friend of Itachi. It was through him that I was introduced to Itachi, and later, Sasuke, the sons of the clan head.

We were friends, little fish. They were my best friends, my beating heart, walking around outside my body, the ones I could tell everything but my greatest secret. Itachi was two years older than me, Shisui five. But somehow that didn't matter.

Shisui enrolled at the academy at the normal age, but Itachi joined the academy early, and a few years later, around the time of your birth, so did I. I graduated and became a genin at the same time they joined ANBU – two years before the massacre.

Things changed after that. I was often busy with my team, but I still saw how ANBU wore at them. Itachi especially. Because this is the thing which breaks my heart: Itachi is a pacifist. He hates violence, and hates himself for committing it. ANBU ruined him. It was a rot that set in, eating away at him from the inside out, till he was hollow. Like the rot that set in to our clan, incubated in the environment of suspicion after the kyuubi attack. Members of the clan – powerful, influential members, the head among them – began planning a coup.

Things happened so quickly after that, in those two years. Our mother died, and our father sank into his grief. My genin team took a C-rank mission that went badly wrong. My teammate, Anchuu, was killed, and I was injured badly enough that I was suspended from duty indefinitely. I made a friend with a fellow traitor, and the last details of how we’d escape fell into place.

Itachi was ordered to spy on the coup planning. Eventually, Danzo ordered Itachi to slay the clan, down to the babes in their cradles, holding the promise of Sasuke's survival over him to ensure he complied.

On the day Itachi killed our family,  I put the plans and preparations I'd made into action, leaving false evidence of our deaths, and fled.

That last sentence is so innocuous, isn't it, little fish? Such an inoffensive way to describe what I did to make it happen. I'm ashamed of so much about that day. Leaving Sasuke behind is only the least of those sins.

This is why I put down the kunai, when the black urge to end it rises. What I did is only justified by what I did it for – this clan, the safety of Iwa's walls, the chance for something better than what we left behind. I’ve forfeited my right to kill myself, because I have debts to the dead that will take a lifetime to repay.

It took me three months to reach Iwa, half-mad with grief and self-loathing, barely stable enough to ensure you didn’t starve [...]

**Author's Note:**

> Prologue to a story which has been bugging me for months now. If you're interested in seeing more about this verse/want to heckle the author/are curious what insanity drove me to this, you can check out the [Uchiha Yoko](http://lectorel.tumblr.com/tagged/Uchiha+Yoko) tag on my tumblr.


End file.
